Roots Like Ours
by lifeinahole
Summary: Emma works nights at a bar and is rudely awoken when a tree removal company shows up next door after a super late shift. Enter the charming Killian Jones, who's not only good at taking down trees, but also at scaling her walls. (Captain Swan AU, ONE-SHOT)


_Written for my Tumblr soulmate and owner of my soul, Miss Carley (oubliette14) in honor of her birthday, which is still a week away. Better early than late!_

* * *

At 1:45am bar time, Emma makes the last call for alcohol. The other two bartenders echo her, until the entire bar is well aware that they have to get their damn drinks now or forever hold their boozy peace. It's still after 2:30am when the last patron is coerced into giving up his drink, subtle threats tumbling from Jefferson's lips as he pries the beer bottle out of the customer's hands. Turns out, it was empty anyway. When the customers are gone, the doors are locked, the cash collected, and then it's all about cleaning.

Emma likes her job at Your Favorite Bar. She'd be hard-pressed to say she loves it, but it's what she does and she's comfortable behind the hand-made stone slab that separates her from the patrons. She takes a certain amount of pride in wiping down the smooth surface, the epoxy covering the pebbles just as shiny as the day it was sealed. Despite her loner nature, she also enjoys talking to the people that she serves. There's something almost freeing about being the council for someone who has no other hope besides the liquid in front of them. If she can talk them out of another shot, she considers it a job well done, even if that's less money for the bar. Where one seat opens up, there's always someone in line waiting to take it.

Jefferson has wandered off to clean the kitchen, Ruby the patio, and so Emma is left in the open expanse of the bar. She makes sure to turn up the music, hearing a whoop of approval from the kitchen as she moves out to the dining area to start cleaning. This part is almost as ingrained into her as breathing. She collects the glasses first, placing them all on the bar before going out with a rag to wipe down each table, each stool, and each booth. She flips all the chairs onto the short tables and picks up larger debris from the floor. Her work on this side done, she goes back behind the bar.

From there, it's a systematic order. She hardly ever lets their workspace get too disorganized, so it's a matter of returning a few stray bottles to their respective shelves before getting to cleaning the glasses, blenders, shakers, and strainers. As she's working, Jefferson pops his head out to let her know he's going to count the drawers and Ruby comes in to clean the bathrooms when she's done with the patio. At this rate, she may get home at a decent hour. Well, decent for a bartender.

The three of them work well together. They have a system. But she can say the same for any of the other bartenders she works with. While Ingrid's whole business procedure is near flawless, the one thing she excels at is hiring the right staff. Any drama that occurs in these walls is solely because of the patrons, not the employees.

The flow of familiarity in Emma's work is making it go faster, but she hears Ruby yelp and call to her from the direction of the bathrooms just as she's finishing her closing duties. She knew it was going too smoothly. She barely gets the door to the men's room open before she blanches at the stench, wanting nothing more than to close the door and run far, far away, but instead she turns her head and hollers for Jefferson. They're always together for the good parts, so they're always together for the shit parts as well. No pun intended.

Because of the little bathroom incident, it's nearly 3:45am when she finally stumbles into the small rental house Ingrid is leasing to her. It's a little one-story thing, without a basement, but plenty of room for Emma and the small amount of possessions she has. The walk-in closet is only half-full and the room that serves as an office has only ever held a single lamp, a small desk, and her computer. She kicks the back door closed, remembering to lock it before stumbling through the dark house and straight to the bathroom.

She has no energy to shower at all, but she needs to wash away the grime of their last cleaning project before she can sleep with any sort of peace of mind. The water is barely even warm when she steps in, her hair hastily piled on top of her head to avoid getting it wet, and she only stays in long enough to wash her body before she's shutting off the water again and wrapping a towel around herself. From there, her nightly ritual of getting ready for bed is an act of autopilot. Face washed, contacts out, teeth cleaned, and body dried off, she wanders to her dresser to pull out fresh pajamas.

Tonight is a night for the pajamas that have served better than any security blanket ever could. They're older than damn near any other thing she owns. Threadbare, seen the wash too many times, they consist of pants that sit too low that happen to look like flood-pants now, and a tank top that leaves a couple inches of her midsection exposed. They're covered in Tweety Bird, and she knows she's held on to them for too long, but they're her favorites. They have actual healing properties for nights that go wrong, bad dates, and rough colds. So she's kept them.

Emma finally drops into bed at a few minutes past 4am. She makes sure an alarm is set for some time in the afternoon just in case before plugging her phone in and discarding her glasses next to it. Minutes after touching her head to the pillow, she is sound asleep. With luck, she won't wake up until the sun is already directly overhead since she'll be doing this all over again tomorrow night.

Of course, the wonder of sleep couldn't last long. Emma nearly falls out of bed when she hears shouting outside her house. If someone is breaking in, they have chosen the wrong time, and the wrong person to fuck with. Her eyes peel open because the shouting stops only to be replaced by the sound of a chainsaw.

"You've gotta be shitting me," she groans. She tries to roll over, shoves her head under her pillow in an attempt to drown out the noise, but a wood chipper starts up shortly after, and Emma knows any thoughts of sleeping are completely dashed.

She's pissed, _livid_ actually, because when she spots the clock, the blurry numbers tell her it's just after 7am and she can't rightfully call the police on the pricks that are ruining her sleep. But the unnecessary noise between the machinery, the laughter, and hollering is quickly setting the fuse on her nerves and she has half a mind to give these guys what they deserve. Even half asleep, she knows she can take down a grown man if need be.

"Killian, get your head out of your arse and _do your job_ ," one of the voices yells. Of course, due to the paper thin walls of the rental, the guy sounds like he's on her fucking roof and a strangled scream comes out of her. That's _it._

The covers get angrily shoved, so forcefully that they fall to the floor, and Emma flings herself from her bed. She wrenches the blinds apart to peer out and squints at the tree removal truck sitting in the driveway of the abandoned house next to hers. She can't make out shit without her glasses though, so she shoves the frames on her face and heads for the front door.

The screen door slams shut from her angry exit and the guy standing in front of the truck actually flinches, his shoulders hunching up around his ears like he knows he's about to be scolded.

"Just what the _hell_ do you think you're doing?" Emma barks at him.

It isn't until he turns around, already stammering an apology that Emma's mind shuts down, turns to syrup as she takes in every detail of the man who's just shifted to face her. _Oh._

First impression gives her blue eyes. Such _clear_ , blue eyes and unruly dark hair that's ruffling in the humid breeze. She wonders what it would feel like to have that hair between her fingers, and then tries to think of _anything_ else. But it doesn't help that his toned arms are exposed from the way the sleeves of his company t-shirt are rolled over his shoulders, or that his jeans have seen much better days. She's starting to feel shallow because all she can think about is those jeans crumpled on her bedroom floor and she hasn't even been listening to whatever he's been saying.

"…alright there, lass?"

"Uhh, I'm fine." It's the best she can manage, but the wood chipper starts again and she remembers her original reason for coming out here and she grits her teeth at the noise. "I mean, I'm _not_ fine, because it's the fucking ass-crack of dawn and I just went to bed three hours ago and you just woke me up."

"Once again, I apologize for the ruckus," he says, but there's this look in his eyes and this smile on his face that screams that he's not sorry at all, and when his eyes briefly shift down her body, Emma finally realizes what she's wearing and she just wants to crawl under the nearest rock and die of embarrassment. "Excellent choice in sleepwear," he drawls, confirming her dread while she scrambles to save the last shred of her dignity.

"Killian, what the bloody hell is going on down there? We need to get this done in a _timely_ manner, you git, so stop flirting and get your arse back to work!"

Emma shields her eyes as she looks for the mystery voice in the trees, only to find a similar looking man above her.

"Don't mind my little brother, milady," the man calls down. "Just give him a swat on the nose and he'll run away with his tail between his legs."

The grin that curls her lips up is more sinister than the one _Killian_ had worn a moment ago, now that he's blushing to the tips of what appear to be the most adorable ears she's ever seen. He reaches a hand up to scratch the back of his neck and mumbles another apology before stalking off in the direction of the second truck parked at the curb. Emma shields her eyes as she looks back up at the other man, smiling broadly.

"It's okay. Just you and your _little brother_ try to keep it down with the yelling. People are trying to sleep around here."

With a hearty laugh from the man in the tree, Emma turns around and heads back into her house. She revels in the air conditioning for a second, leaning against the door and closing her eyes. From outside, she can hear the brothers arguing, their voices muffled except for one clearly enunciated "Sod off!" from Killian.

When Emma looks in the mirror after going in, she sees exactly what Killian saw when he looked at her and she gasps in horror. No wonder he was adamantly asking if she was okay. While her hair looked great last night, a mixture of braids woven in with everything pulled half up, it now looks like she's been locked in a tower for a couple years without a hairbrush.

In her sleep, the braids tangled amongst this poof haloing her head. Even with it pulled up in the shower, some of the strands got misted, so some of it is haphazardly curled from sleeping directly after getting it wet. Since she didn't take a lot of time to wash her face, some of the leftover make-up is smudged around her eyes. In horror, she leans closer to the mirror. Nope. Not the make-up. That's just the color of sleep deprivation. She groans and strips off her pjs, hoping a _real_ shower will at least make her feel more human. After that, maybe coffee is in order, because it's clear that these guys aren't going anywhere soon.

When the mail arrives at 10am, the men are still out there working and it takes a great deal of self-control to not drop into one of her patio chairs and enjoy the show. It's also hot and humid beyond all reason, mid-July pressing down around her every time she steps outside, and she's yet to hear them stop for much of a break. With coffee in her system, she feels mildly bad about verbally attacking them earlier, so she wanders back into the house and deposits her mail on the table before grabbing a couple bottles of water out of her fridge. So what if her secondary agenda is to show that she doesn't always look like a complete lunatic.

It's not until she's outside again that she wonders if this may have been a bad idea. But she's already out of the house and walking towards them, so she has to follow through. It's with minimal awkwardness that she approaches the men and hands over the bottles, explaining that she's already exhausted and doesn't want to have to call an ambulance if one of them collapses due to dehydration.

The brothers are named Killian and Liam, and the third man working with them goes by Smee, although no one really explains or even seems to know why. She spends their coffee break talking to them, until Killian's watch beeps a few times. She excuses herself, then, to go sit on the patio and hide behind her sunglasses as she pretends to read the newspaper.

Instead, she spends the time watching Killian don a heavy pair of gloves to move branches from where they fall to the ground and over to Smee to load into the wood chipper. She watches the way his biceps flex, and the elegant arching of his back as he bends to grab another felled piece of wood. At one point, he lifts the bottom of his shirt to wipe away the sweat dripping from his face, and Emma tries so hard to not gawk at the faint definition of abs or the hair leading down to the waistband of his jeans. Suddenly, being out in the heat is too much and Emma nonchalantly stands up to head back to the relief of cool air, where there are no unfairly attractive men lifting their shirts in front of her.

It isn't until around one o'clock that she hears the noise die down next door, and she's relieved. If they're finished now, she can get in a nap before it's time to leave for work. The relief is short lived, because someone is knocking on the door.

"Hello again, lass." His silky voice comes through the screen with the afternoon heat and she tries to ignore the way it seems to knock against her equilibrium. "I really hate to impose, but I was wondering if I could use your restroom. We have to head straight to another job and they are _not_ friendly people."

She panics a little at the thought of him entering her house, the private little space that few have ever entered besides her version of family and really close friends. But she knows it's an unfair reaction. He wants to use her restroom, not roll around in her dirty laundry. She pushes open the storm door in wordless permission and he flashes a bright grin at her as he thanks her. She directs him back to the bathroom and then shuffles around her tiny office, attempting to look busy while waiting for him to come back out.

She hears the toilet flush and the water in the sink running, and grabs a blank notepad to pretend to read from as she leans against her little desk.

"Just so you know," he starts when he comes back in, "we'll be back next Tuesday. Best to invest in some earplugs or something. We've been contracted to take down most of the trees that have taken over that yard, and then to rework the landscaping after they renovate the house."

"You guys landscape too?"

"Small town. Not a lot of business for one or the other so we just do both." He shrugs a little as he says it, scratching behind his ear and the way he's grinning at her makes Emma feel like he's burrowing into her endearment.

"Well, thanks for the warning," she says, and finds it comes out sincere. "I uh, I usually work nights. So I only got three hours of sleep before you guys showed up."

His hand is resting on the door knob, getting ready to exit, but he turns to her instead and props up against the door.

"What keeps you out so late?"

"I'm a bartender. So some nights I don't get home until three or four in the morning."

"Which bar?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?" She's not even sure where the response comes from. Flirting is not her thing unless she's trying to get better tips out of drunks, but here she is flirting with the stranger she let in her house.

"Perhaps I would," Killian responds. As if aware he's not going to get anything more out of her at the moment, he straightens and turns the doorknob again. "See you next week, Swan." The smile curling the edges of his mouth damn near makes it a promise.

When they show up again the next week, it's after a relatively early night for her so the waking up process is much less painful. As if there's a magnet pulling her out, she goes to visit with them and bring more water when she hears the noise cut out for their break. She pretends to not notice the way that Killian's gaze lingers on her longer than it should, or how he's so close to her on the bumper of the company truck. Of course, she's the one that sat down next to him, so she's fully to blame for that one.

Emma flees back to her house after their break is over to get work done, deciding that nothing good can come from hanging around with the men of _Jones Bros. Tree and Lawn Services_. She hides away inside until she hears the truck start up when they're all done. Figuring the coast is clear, she opens the front door long enough to grab her mail and the newspaper. Killian is just about to hop into the driver's seat of the truck when he spots her, pausing long enough to smile and wave at her before he closes the door.

It's another two weeks before she actually sees them again, having slept through the majority of their work the week before after another grueling closing shift. By that time, the difference in the yard next to hers is noticeable. They've been slowly taking down the taller trees first, Liam high in the branches with Killian below to transfer the felled branches to the wood chipper, working their way down each tree projected to come down. She watches from her window for a bit, just observing the simple mechanics of their working order. They all move and act as if it's second nature. The house next door, just as small as hers, is becoming more visible with every visit.

She doesn't go out to visit that day, either, deciding instead to spend her time cleaning her small space. With the crazy hours she's been working, things like washing the dishes and doing the laundry have fallen by the wayside. When she peeks out to see their progress, Killian is looking at her house with an almost wistful expression on his face.

The unfamiliar pang of missing him sits in her stomach, and Emma honestly doesn't know what to do with that feeling. She doesn't do the whole _friends_ thing. She has her friends at the bar, and they are all she ever needs. She has the occasional one-night-stand to scratch the itch of physical need, and that's where those encounters end. But Killian, with his sweet smiles and curiosity, his blue eyes and calming voice, doesn't fit into either of those categories. So she doesn't know what to do about it. She doesn't want to take the chance that she's wrong about him, that she'll let him in and he'll end up like the others she's let beyond her walls before.

But there's always the chance that it won't go anywhere. Around lunchtime she makes up her mind to take a chance, for the first time in a long time, and see where this could go.

It's the end of their work day when she slips out of her house while Liam and Smee are occupied, leaving Killian by himself away from the others.

"Hi," she says when she creeps a little closer to where he's leaning against the truck. His whole demeanor changes when she speaks, the exhaustion from working in the afternoon sun sliding off his shoulders the moment he looks up.

The conversation she engages him in for the few minutes they're alone is humdrum at best, but she made sure to wear her work t-shirt on this excursion out and she's hoping he notices. If there's ever a chance to see how they'll interact, to see if he will become a friend or something else, she wants it to be on her turf. She glances around to see where Liam and Smee are, but her attention is brought right back to Killian when he tugs on the bottom hem of the shirt.

"Is this where you work, then?" he asks, his gaze flitting down to the logo but not lingering. The urge to kiss him for not ogling her tits is almost unreal.

"Yeah, my shift starts in an hour."

His fingers are still gripping the cotton, drawing her closer to him, and she's so tempted to reach out and touch him skin to skin to see what might happen. As it is, his eyes are fixed on his own hand where it's still touching fabric and he suddenly seems to shake himself out of a stupor as he finally drops his hand back to his side.

"Well," his voice comes out even, "I just might have to stop in and visit. It's been a while since I've gone out to have a drink."

"Does that mean it hasn't been long since you've stayed in to have a drink?"

"I do sit down with Liam from time to time to have a beer, but that's hardly the same as visiting beautiful bartenders at their places of employment. Especially when she's gotten to see me work a time or two."

It's so hard to ignore the way he says "beautiful" and looks right into her eyes as he says it. So very hard. At the approaching voices of the other men, Emma backs away quickly and gives him a little wave, doing her best to not run back to her house.

At work that night, Emma glances at the face of every single person who walks in the bar. It's not like she's waiting for him to show up or anything, she just tends to her customers even more carefully than usual. She thinks she sees his hair at one point, but stomps out excitement to appear aloof and unaffected. All her work is for nothing when the man turns and brown eyes are scanning the room, the scruff missing from the unfamiliar face. She huffs out a breath and convinces herself she's being ridiculous.

Work picks up in a rush of end-of-shift drinkers, so Emma doesn't even have time to _think_ about who may or may not be at the bar. When she gets a chance to breathe again, her eyes jump from patron to patron—some regulars, some just strangers. Just because he said he was going to visit didn't mean he would be in as soon as he got out of work.

There's a couple of men on her end laughing and carrying on, but she knows all of them. The ones in the middle are all new, but they're either paired off or alone, all the way down to the other end. One guy at the end of the bar has the brim of a baseball cap low, his head turned, but he looks like just another man wanting to ignore the world and get lost in a drink. However, that jawline looks awfully familiar. By the time she's able to make it to that side of the bar, he's gone. She picks up the empty bottle and tosses it into the trash can to her left and shrugs, realizing too late that it would look weird if anyone saw the gesture.

The night is ticking by, and she glances at the clock. She won't admit to getting her hopes up just the tiniest bit. She reminders herself again that he said he would visit. He didn't say he would visit immediately. She purses her lips and wipes down the counter until another patron sits down.

"Now what if I hadn't been finished with that, Swan?"

Her head snaps up at the sound of his voice. She barely manages to tamp down the full-blown smile that threatens to emerge because she _knew_ it was him.

"Then I would say you're a big fan of backwash because that's all that was left in there." She's glad her voice comes out with the usual pinch of snark as a hint of her smile plays at the corners of her mouth. He doesn't need to see how excited she is to see him, after all.

"You look like a natural back there," Killian remarks, a genuine smile on his face.

"I used to have a lot of time on my hands. Taught myself a lot with YouTube videos," she explains.

Killian opens his mouth to make a remark on that, but before he has a chance, she's called to the other end of the bar to take care of the regulars. She shoots him an apologetic look before sliding down to refill drinks on the other end of the bar.

She's able to wander back sparingly for the next half hour, but gets called away to tend to this pain in the ass group of men, the lead of which makes her skin crawl like he's one of the bugs that invades her house on a regular basis. It's not even due to the fact that Greg Mendell has connections to her first ex-boyfriend. In fact, she and Neal hashed out any problems they had long ago, but it was that Greg had always touted the fact that he was better than Storybrooke, and thus better than all the people that lived there. Nevermind the fact that _he_ lived there, because he was apparently special and didn't count.

After running back and forth what feels like a million times to fetch them ketchup, and salt, and napkins, and new beers, and a round of shots, and the fucking kitchen sink, she's able to glance down to the side of the bar where Killian was situated, but he's gone. She wanders over to his empty bottle, placed atop a neatly folded napkin. With ease, she chucks the bottle into the bin, and the napkin is about to follow until she spots the writing inside. Killian's handwriting is neat, the tidy marks almost flowing together in a message to her. She's amazed that even his writing sounds like his voice.

 _Swan, Sorry I had to leave without saying goodnight. Five o'clock comes way too early, despite how much I enjoyed watching you flip your bottle opener and spin bottles of liquor. (No really, that was brilliant!) If you ever have a slower night, feel free to alert me and I will come visit and pester you to teach me how to do that behind the back bottle toss. Bloody fascinating. –Killian_

Below the message are the digits that make up his phone number and part of Emma wants to roll her eyes, and the other part wants to grin until the room is lit up, but that's an uncharacteristic Emma behavior so everyone would know. And no one needs to know what's going on in her mind, so she pulls out her phone to enter his number into her contacts and shoves the napkin in her pocket.

When the break between tree removal and landscaping arrives, Killian comes in to visit her more often. With the exchange of numbers, he's remarkably been a gentleman and only texts to ask if she'll be working on the nights he can stop in.

They get to know each other slowly, during the lulls in drink orders.

Other than his name and the fact that he has a brother, she now knows that said brother is married and they have a little girl, that said little girl has Killian wrapped around her finger, and that said Killian has not had a real relationship in several years after a bad heartbreak. He doesn't elaborate. Says he prefers to keep his past where it is and claims that the only girl he'll ever love again is the four year old who calls him "Uncle Killy" and makes him paint her nails.

She skims the surface of her past and gives him bits and pieces, of how she ended up back in Storybrooke in the first place (after her own tumultuous relationships), how she doesn't keep a lot of people close because that's easier than making a lot of friends, and how she may have moved back two years ago but there are still boxes sitting in her closet that she's never unpacked for fear of having to leave again.

Her coworkers pick up on the new addition rather quickly, but don't pry. The guys all give him considering looks, since none of them have seen Emma smile this much around a man when there's not a tip involved. Other than some gruff, brotherly vibes, they are all kind to him and the other girls readily make sure he's tended to if Emma is called away to another side of the bar for extended periods of time.

If anything, it's all really comfortable for the couple weeks that it's going great. But one day Killian texts her that he'll be there and then he doesn't show up, and the nagging self-doubt comes swinging in full force. Emma gets an uncomfortable pit in her stomach, the feeling of disappointment settling heavy. The whole night is a bust after that, and she struggles to keep smiling, to put flair into the drink preparations, to do anything with the same measure of excitement that she does when _he_ is sitting on the other side of the bar. She gets mad at herself for getting in too deep, and mad at him for making her care. Her success at work has never depended on anyone else, and she thinks that maybe it's a sign to return to that kind of plan. It was all working perfectly fine before Killian showed up.

She wakes up to an apology from him, an excuse about falling asleep at Liam's after dinner, and when she doesn't respond he sends along three more variations over the course of the day. For a solid week after that, she leaves the texts from him unanswered until, with the hint of rejection finally coming through, he tells her to text him if she ever feels like it. And then his texts stop. She tries to not care or notice, but the looks that the other girls give her are sad and questioning and she can't handle those expressions, so she just smiles brighter and works harder.

"So what happened to your friend?" Mary Margaret asks one night. Emma knows she probably looks like shit because the landscaping overhaul has begun on the property next to hers and she woke after two bad hours of sleep to Killian's voice morosely explaining to Liam that he doesn't see much of Emma anymore. The dejection in his voice drove her out of bed and into the arms of two pots of coffee so she could stay awake long enough to get through her shift.

She tries to avoid the question but Mary Margaret's hand falls softly on her shoulder and Emma realizes that she is now intensely frowning at the jigger in her hand so she sets it down before telling the other woman the whole story. Of all the people at the bar, she and Mary Margaret have the longest history. They were in grade school together, before Emma got shifted to a new family in the foster system, but before that happened they were friends. After yet another crapshoot of a relationship, Emma had packed up the little yellow Volkswagen Bug she'd had since Neal and drove straight back to Storybrooke.

In some kind of freak chance, she'd ended up in Your Favorite Bar where a petit woman with a pixie haircut had looked back at her with familiar eyes and a knowing smile. Mary Margaret introduced her to Ingrid the next day, and two days later she was on payroll. Since then, she's been a pillar of quiet strength in Emma's life.

Currently, the other woman is looking at her with her head tilted to the side, as if trying to shift the pieces of a Picasso painting where they belong. "You know," she finally says, "you've been here long enough that it's okay to let someone new in. It's okay to have someone outside the bar to hang out with, or vent to, or talk to you about something other than beer and liquor sales." She taps her fingers against her chin as she thinks for a minute.

"That's what I did with David, after all. I mean, who else am I supposed to talk to when Ruby forgets to hose off the patio, or Emma doesn't perfectly turn out each bottle label, even though that's her own standard she's messing with." She mock gasps as if she's spilt some big secret and Emma can't stop the laugh that comes bubbling out of her. The smile on Mary Margaret's face is one of a mission accomplished and she reaches over to grab Emma's hand.

"Maybe you should invite him up," the brunette suggests. "I'm going to be leaving here in about a half hour. The bar is dead tonight. It might do you good to have some company."

It's a point too good to argue. They aren't a sports bar. Patrons looking for whatever game is playing on a Monday have flocked to the bars with giant televisions on every wall. That's not what Ingrid is all about. She makes her promotions outside of sporting events and Emma has always been grateful for that. They prefer to work by music, not the cheers and jeers of over-saturated fans. Mary Margaret looks at her again, that motherly look of encouragement that always gets to Emma, and she finally pulls her phone out of her pocket and sends off a quick text. It's nothing special, not an apology. She'd rather do that if and when he's here, where she can face her feelings as she faces him.

His response is a few minutes behind, but it says he'll stop up for a visit. His truck pulls into the parking lot just as Mary Margaret has clocked out, and the other woman gives her one more hopeful smile as she says her goodbyes. She gives Killian a pat on the arm as she walks by him, and he stops short with a confused smile as he eyes the shorter woman leaving, and then the open and empty expanse of the bar.

"To what do I owe the pleasure, Swan?" he asks as he carefully walks up to a stool across from where she's standing. She can see the trepidation behind every movement, the easy smile hiding almost nothing of his true feelings. She wonders, briefly, if they had met under different circumstances if this would be the Killian she would've met.

She's wiping down the bar even though it's already clean just to keep her hands busy but she looks at him when she speaks. "I owe you an apology. And an explanation." She sets a beer down in front of him and takes a long sip from her glass of water before she looks him in the eye again. God, she's never even held his hand and she's afraid of how far gone she is. She takes one more deep breath and tries to find the best way to phrase all of this mess that makes up her parts and pieces.

"I'm good at a lot of things," she says, grabbing two bottles off the green-lit shelves behind her. A third comes down and they're all placed on the bar in front of her as she goes to work preparing one of the bar's specialties. She tosses the shaker in front of her, letting it roll down her arm and drop into her opposite hand before she flips it up easily and catches it once more. From there, it's a process of the different flips and pours she knows, making sure to include Killian's favorite. The vodka is low enough that she easily throws it over her shoulder from behind, bouncing it off the fleshy part above her elbow and catching it all in one fluid movement. It's a relief to see the way his eyes sparkle as she does it.

"One thing I'm not good at is relationships. People. Talking. Putting myself out there." With familiar movements, she picks up two rocks glasses and a jigger, juggling them momentarily before setting all three in front of her and looking him dead in the eye again.

She outlines the worst of it. The roller coaster of a relationship with Neal, and how it ended with explosions and screaming matches after an almost-and-definitely-oops pregnancy, how she'd run into him again in Portland on her way back up here and how they're surprisingly civil now, especially when she had sworn off relationships and he was engaged, and it was clear they had finally both gotten what they wanted, or some semblance of it.

Next comes the relationship with Graham, a police officer she met and lived with in Boston for a very brief time. What had started as a couch surfing expedition ended with her in his bed in between bail bondsperson jobs, back when that was her work of choice, because it gave her an outlet to get rid of some of her aggression while also making a quick buck on some scummy people.

Killian sips his beer and keeps his face tightly controlled as she tells him how Graham died in the line of duty, caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. Her voice gets quiet when she explains that she left most of her belongings behind because she couldn't even stand the thought of going back to his apartment and not have him be there. She gave herself ten minutes of packing, and the rest was abandoned.

The first time he touches her, other than tugging on her t-shirt a couple weeks ago, is to brush his fingers over her fist clenched against the bar. It's just a quick contact. Enough to say _I'm sorry_ without having to actually utter those words. He knows her better than she realized, because it's the last thing she would've wanted to hear at this point, and the touch is more meaningful to her.

Finally she tells him about Walsh from NYC, with his sickly sweet smiles and quiet humor. She almost fell in love with him, but something always held her back. He had proposed after just eight months, wanted her to move in, wanted to get started with _love_ and _marriage_ and _family_ but Emma scuttled away from it all so hard that she almost wondered if it was a sign that she was damaged for good. Turns out it was just some instinct at play, as it turns out Walsh was an all-around shady character, with more sides to his life than she could've guessed. It was an accident that she found the ledger with his embezzlement notes, and the list of rich clients he was blackmailing at his upscale furniture store. He had so many schemes and back-alley deals that her head spun for days after she high-tailed it out of there.

"I suck at relying on people that aren't paid to have my back. So last week, when you didn't show up, I automatically assumed the worst, because most of the people in my life have let me down. And if you controlled how I felt at work, then I had obviously let you too far in. I panicked. I got angry. With you, with myself, with my emotions. All of it." When she finishes speaking, the silence is suddenly deafening to her. But she maintains eye contact and lifts her shoulders in a half-shrug. She's got nothing else. It's all there in front of him.

Killian, who has remained silent this whole time, has an ocean of words behind his eyes. She can see him churning through which ones to use and expects the usual amount of sympathy or pity or some type of rebuke that he'll be different. Instead, he sighs and opens his mouth, and shares.

"There was a woman named Milah, back in England. Hauntingly beautiful, a few years older than me, and as I later found out, very much married." The tale goes downhill from there. Love at first sight for both of them, followed by a rough and tumble affair. He was young and haughty and didn't care when he found out about her husband. Didn't care that she had a son, either, until she told Killian that she wanted him to take her away from her boring and awful life.

"I may have been young, but I was starting to think about marriage and families as well, and I couldn't imagine her leaving her own son behind just to have another child with me. And when I brought it up, she started making claims about coming back for him after everything cooled off. But I could see in her eyes that she didn't mean it. She wanted to use me as an excuse to leave her husband and son behind for good. Figured I would forget about having kids after we started having our adventures."

"And?"

"And I did the worst thing imaginable. I went to her husband, and told him what was going on, and then left. Liam was just starting up his own business over here after he decided to settle down. I got here in time for the wedding and never looked back."

"What about Milah? Did you ever hear from her again?"

"No. But oddly enough I heard from her husband. I got a letter about six months after I moved here. The poor man actually thanked me for coming to him. Milah left anyway. Found someone even younger than I was and ran as fast and as far as she could. But at least he was prepared for it and he and his son were getting through it. He didn't send a return address, so that's the last I heard."

With their stories finished, Killian drains his beer and slides it across the bar to Emma's waiting hand. Her cheeks puff out when she exhales.

"Well, we've certainly covered the spectrum between us, huh?"

His surprised laugh calms her nerves considerably, and she's relieved to see the Killian she's used to sitting across from her. His eyes are still somber, but he's smiling now.

"Don't run from me, love. Now I know, and now you know, and we can get through anything that comes of us. Together." He holds out his hand with his palm up, and here it is. The big moment. It's where it all either comes together or falls apart. But she's oddly calm about it all, so she places her hand in his, the roughness of his calluses both strange and comforting, a physical display of the work he's put in on his life. "So now," he exclaims, gesturing with his free hand to the bottles and shaker in front of them. "What do we have here?"

It feels a lot like changing the subject, but she lets it happen. They've said all they can on the other topics for now that it's time to get back to the two of them in the present. She throws a little ice in the shaker, swirls it around a couple times, and strains the shot into the rocks glasses that have been waiting patiently. She slides one of the shots with perfect momentum to stop just in front of where his hand is now resting.

"What is it?" He's staring at the shot in front of him like it is poison, and Emma chuckles as she puts the various bottles back in their spots and dumps the shaker into the wash bin.

"It's called a Payday. Like the candy bar. Salt lick, then the shot."

"A what now?"

"Have you ever had tequila?" Her eyebrow goes up when she asks, incredulity painted on her face.

"No. I like to stick with things like rum or whiskey, and I usually don't drink things that need a step-by-step guide."

She huffs out a sigh and grabs the salt shaker from where she placed it nearby. "All you have to do is lick," she pauses to lick the skin on her wrist where she normally would if she were drinking. "Then salt," she adds as she sprinkles the salt over her tattoo. "Then when it's time to drink, you lick that, take the shot, and voila! Now you know!"

He's chewing on his lip in thought as she explains, and his eyes light up when she's done. Demonstration over, she moves to wipe the salt off on her jeans but he catches her hand before she can.

"I mean, you've already gotten it ready. Might as well put it to use. That would just be a waste of perfectly good salt," he explains thinly, shifting his grip on her wrist to avoid smudging the salt off. "Salt first?"

Emma just nods, unable to speak with his fingers pressing against her skin. She can feel the goosebumps prickling along her arm, up to her shoulder, before spreading across her chest. She thanks whatever god led to the invention of lined bras, because he does not need to know how turned on she is by this touch, so different from when he held her hand earlier, and he hasn't even licked the salt yet.

And then he does. His tongue glides across the sensitive skin inside her wrist, gathering each granule as it goes and all she can do is stare at him with her jaw halfway to the floor. The scruff of his facial hair just barely grazes her as he shifts away to grab the shot, knocking it back quickly. Her heart is beating faster, her chest damn near heaving with the sexual energy coursing through her, his hand still gripping her wrist lightly as she watches his throat work the shot down. He taps the shot glass to the bar twice, his grin curling his lips up and his eyes telling her that he knows _exactly_ what she's thinking about as he licks his lips for the last drops. How did the last half hour of her life go from where it was to where it is?

"Now _that_ was delicious," he quips, just as his thumb grazes her tattoo. "I may have to try another."

She wants to drag him over the bar and do wicked things to him, or let him do wicked things with that tongue that so obviously knows what it's doing as it plays at the corner of his mouth. She's still a little dazed and thinking of the easiest way to jump the bar without knocking anything over. She needs to calm down. It's with great effort that she extricates her hand from his grasp, takes her shot, and makes a lame excuse about going to the restroom.

It's not like the breather helps, though. Her thoughts are still swirling with want and need, a voice chanting in her head _kiss him, kiss him!_ And she wants to, she realizes. Really _really_ wants to. With one more steadying breath, she exits the bathroom and knows that if she doesn't kiss him tonight, she will probably combust.

Killian is turned to face her when she returns, his elbow propped on the back of the barstool and eyebrow raised. Beneath it all, she sees an expression that possibly mirrors her thoughts, though, so she takes one last big gulp of air before approaching him on this side of the bar. There's no barrier between them now, emotional or physical. She runs her hand along the surface, imagining she can feel the individual pebbles beneath the epoxy as she makes her way to the end where he sits.

"Swan-"

She doesn't give him another chance to speak. Her lips find his as her eyes slide closed, the relief of _finally_ almost palpable in her mind. That first kiss is sweet, and in no way due to the Frangelico and Buttershots in the Payday. It's because they both start gentle, a tentative press of lips as her arms wind around his neck and she steps into the space he creates for her between his knees. His hands settle at her waist, thumbs rubbing soothingly through the soft cotton of her t-shirt. And it's so good, _so good_ , that she can't help the whimper that catches in the back of her throat, the whimper that turns into a moan when his tongue slides against her lips and she opens her mouth to him.

The moment hits both of them at roughly the same time, when it stops being sweet and starts being _need_ and she needs to feel the way his teeth nip at her bottom lip, she needs to feel his arms going around her back and hauling her closer. She needs to feel his hair between her fingers as she imagined when she first saw him, when he was the stranger waking her up after a long night of work and all she wanted was sleep quickly replaced by wanting to know exactly how this right here would feel.

She's on the verge of climbing into his lap when the chime over the door rings and Emma springs back so fast that she almost topples the chair next to Killian's. A woman peeks around the corner, looking between Emma and Killian.

"Oh! Are you guys still open?"

It takes Emma a couple seconds to regain her voice, and she stammers out an answer that they are, in fact, still open. The woman heads back out to alert her friends and Emma turns back to Killian wanting nothing but to continue where they left off.

"I should uh, let you get back to your work," Killian says when they're alone again and she nods in response as her hand automatically reaches out to smooth his hair back down from where her fingers have lifted it out of place. His eyes flutter closed and he sighs. "I'll see you soon." It isn't a question, and for once she isn't afraid of the way her heart warms towards him. He leans in to place a sweet kiss on her cheek and Emma restrains herself from wrenching him back to her lips.

An hour later, when the interrupting party has already left, Emma is tempted to text Killian and tell him to come back, but she sees it's past eleven and she assumes he has to work in the morning, so she stocks the entire bar area to distract herself instead. She's shocked when her phone buzzes in her pocket and she sees the text notification with Killian's name on it.

 _I can't stop thinking about that kiss, Swan._

She swallows hard and tries to construct a message to send back to him, but her words fail her. It would be easier if he were here, where she could just _show_ him how much she's thinking about it, too. The phone buzzes again in her hands.

 _I'm sorry if that was too forward. I don't want to scare you off or anything. Not after tonight._

 ** _I already told you I'm not too good with words. More of a show instead of tell kinda girl._**

Suddenly, the phone is buzzing insistently in her hands. She barely answers with a "hello" before he's speaking. "And what would you show me if I were still there, Swan?" His voice is low and sleepy, and she can imagine that voice pressed against her collarbones in the middle of the night with wandering hands and errant lips.

"Wouldn't you like to know," she echoes from the time he was in her house, the day they met.

"Oh Swan, you've no idea." The way his voice dips lower at that has her stomach tying itself in knots and she's surprised by the effect it has on her. With no one in the bar to see, she rubs her thighs together, suddenly all too aware of how long it's been since she's been with someone. "You see, if I were still there," Killian continues, "I'd show you how much I appreciate those nimble fingers of yours. I've adored watching them when you're preparing drinks. Just so you're aware, the way you grip a bottle of beer is downright erotic, love."

" _Killian,_ " is all she can hiss out, because as he speaks she can't help but think what she would do with her hands if he were right back where he was at the end of the bar.

"I think I'd really like seeing you spread out on the top of that bar with your hair messed up from my fingers and my face between your-"

"Oh my god!" The phone drops from her fingers and clatters against the aforementioned bar and she can hear him chuckling even from where the phone rests. She hastens to pick it back up, huffing in annoyance even as she brings the phone back to her ear. "I hope you don't kiss your niece with that mouth, Jones."

"Sorry, love. May have gotten a bit carried away."

"No you're not. I can hear your smugness from here," she groans out. She's already thinking about how much later she's going to stay up just trying to relieve some of the pressure that's built up from talking to him.

"Only slightly, then. I usually try to take a woman out to dinner before jumping straight into that sort of thing. You can blame it on the sleepiness and that wonderful shot you prepared for me earlier."

Even at the mention of it, all she can think of is Killian's tongue moving against the skin on her wrist and his previous words and she hears him laughing again at the noise that struggles its way out of her throat.

"I'm afraid I'm falling asleep, love. Wish me goodnight so I might dream of you?"

She hums at first, the dulcet tones of his voice making her smile despite the words she's about to say. "Killian Jones, he'll remove all your trees so he can suck the sap out of them." When he chuckles this time, it's even lower and it sounds like what she wants to hear when she's going to bed at night. She's glad he's not there to see her shiver at the thought, the unfamiliar feeling of want and need crawling across the goosebumps that form on her skin.

"Only when I'm mostly asleep. I assure you, this is a rare occurrence. You wouldn't believe the way I would twist what you've just said if I were a little more alert." It's her turn to laugh this time, knowing he's right. But he changes the tone again as he just about whispers, "I hope the rest of your shift goes by quickly."

"Me too," she says sincerely. Then, quietly, "Goodnight Killian."

"Sweet dreams when you do sleep, Swan," he responds just as softly before the call ends.

Emma's left staring at the phone for far longer than necessary before the chime over the door knocks her out of her thoughts. She wants to break that chime and lock the door, but when she looks up, it's just Ruby.

"Hey. I thought I'd come by to help close up. And I brought food!" While there are some nights she doesn't mind closing up alone, this is one time she's eternally grateful for the company. Left alone with her thoughts, she's not entirely sure she would've accomplished anything. Ruby chatters endlessly about business at the bar and how much closing on Sundays and Mondays is a pain in the ass because it's mostly done alone. "You're in a much better mood than I last saw you, but I figured you'd like the company since you were alone in here after that group left."

Emma's ears perk up at that. "Yeah? How'd you know that?"

"Well, I do live across the street. So I see when people are here or not."

"Huh. What else can you see from there?" she thinks to ask, a creeping sensation poking her in the ribs when Ruby says that.

"Eh. Not a lot. But at least when Victor and I make out on Sunday shifts, we lock the door and go to the cooler."

"Ruby!" Her exasperation outweighs her embarrassment for only a moment, and then she's covering her face with her hands to hide from Ruby's all-knowing gaze. To her credit, Ruby stays silent the entire time, but when Emma looks up again, the brunette is grinning ear to ear resembling the wolf that got Little Red Riding Hood _way_ too much.

"Just a friend, huh?" she finally asks Emma, teeth flashing in feral glee.

She has two options. Tell Ruby enough to keep the other woman happy and out of her hair for a little bit, or stay silent and deal with Ruby pestering until she caves. She takes the former option and doles out enough information to satisfy the other's curiosity. Of course, her peace is short lived, as by the time they close up the bar a half hour later, Ruby is giving her pointers on the best places to make out in the bar and kindly advising Emma to climb Killian like a tree the next chance she gets. The humor of that statement is not lost on her at all.

Those comments are met with a long-suffering "Goodnight, Ruby!" as Emma practically jumps into the Bug and drives home.

Emma wakes the next morning to Killian's cheery voice responding to something Liam has just said, but even as she groans, she's smiling. From the volume and positioning of their voices, she's guessing they're staring work today on the tiny strip of grass between the driveway and house. Killian is chattering about something, and it takes several minutes as her brain adjusts to being awake to realize that he's telling Liam about the tricks they use to pour drinks at the bar. To hear someone else talk about what they do makes her unspeakably proud for a moment. Yeah, she's taught herself different ways to turn alcohol into artwork, but to actually hear an outsider's perspective on how it looks is brand new.

"You sound like a lovesick puppy, little brother," Liam's response is muffled and teasing, and she can imagine the face that Killian makes in response.

"Younger brother, and I am not! I just find it fascinating, is all."

"Oh? And do you pay attention to all the bartenders, or just Emma?"

She bites her lip as she waits for Killian's response. When there's nothing but silence, she stifles a laugh and decides to save him the awkward response and only raises her voice slightly to be heard.

"I can hear you guys."

" _Bloody hell_ , love." That response from Killian, along with a clanging of some kind of tool hitting the driveway. She does laugh this time, and can hear some kind of grumbling response from Killian.

"You've just about given the poor man a heart attack, lass," comes a response from Liam, and she chuckles again as she extracts herself from her bed to get on with her day.

It doesn't occur to her until later, the fact that Killian was just now telling Liam all about Emma and work, and she realizes in hindsight that his walls may have been as high as hers. That maybe he was holding off mentioning anything to his brother until he knew what direction they were going in as well. It's this realization that helps her gloss over the fact that Liam used the dreaded L word in reference to Killian's feelings for her, because they know where they stand, and it's not quite there yet.

It takes weeks between their first kiss and their second. Summer is transitioning to fall with the temperatures just beginning to bite in the evenings, the light fading earlier, the wind kicking up a little bit more than it was when she first met Killian. The second kiss is stolen between crammed schedules, late nights, and early mornings. The landscaping is finished on the house next door, so at least Emma's mornings are uninterrupted, but that starts a new round of longing and she wishes sometimes that her bed wasn't so half-occupied anymore.

With the fall promotions starting at Your Favorite Bar, it's rare to find that Monday night bliss where Emma and Killian had the place to themselves. But coming up is one week, one magical week, between landscaping wrapping up and the start of leaf removal, where they may actually get to spend more time together. Emma holds out hope, but she should know better by this point in her life.

Suddenly, the bar staff is scrambling schedules to compensate when August decides to finally fulfill his dream of being a writer. He leaves after a hearty goodbye to travel cross-country on his motorcycle, and the remaining employees all work to fill in the gaps before they can find a new server.

By this point, other than a handful of kissing (quick make out sessions in his truck before her shift begins, one really great moment in the cooler ala Ruby's suggestion when she goes for a break, five whole dates that would end before midnight so Killian didn't turn into a pumpkin) the newly minted couple ( _"You can say boyfriend, Emma," said with a cheeky grin_ ) is only running into problems with finding time. One night, he has the audacity to text her as he's sitting with David, chatting with the other man like there's not a care in the world as filthy promises that read more like poetry fill her text messaging inbox.

So when this week hits where they should finally have some time to enact something simple like a sleepover and she has to work, both are beyond capacity for sexual frustration, and it's starting to wear them both down. Go figure, then, that it would be the night Greg Mendell tried to start a fresh batch of shit cookies while sitting two chairs down from Killian on their newly begun karaoke nights.

There's a moment of respite, when the customers are either all cared for or being taken care of by Jefferson and Ruby, where Emma gets to lean over and grab Killian's hand, delighting in the way he rubs some of the tension out of her palm before motioning for the other hand to repeat the actions. He's telling her a story of something his niece did that day, content smile on her face, her hand enclosed in those of her boyfriend's, when Greg snaps his fingers, _snaps his fingers_ , to get Emma's attention. The smile drops from her face as soon as she looks over at him and he dangles his beer bottle in front of his face to indicate it's time for a new one.

She's just popped the top off the new one when Greg opens his mouth. But it's not to thank her, or anything like that. No. Never with him.

"Emma, if I knew you needed your tree trimmed, I would've worn flannel and called myself a lumberjack to get into your pants ages ago," he says. And she can tell he's hammered. And her jaw is clenching.

From the corner of her eye she sees that Killian is off his seat before Greg is even finished speaking, but Emma is way ahead of him. When Jefferson sees her twirl her bottle opener and tuck it into her back pocket, he smirks and moves wide of her. Having worked with Emma since day one, he knows better than to get in her way. Killian takes this as a sign and calmly, if tensely, sits back down.

"Aw, what's the matter Greg? Still upset that your ex-girlfriend didn't take you back? Still mad that she's engaged and went off to Tallahassee with Neal? Does it just _grate_ on your nerves that she got out of here and you didn't, especially when you're the one that seems so desperate to leave here?"

To Emma's absolute shock, while this has all been happening, the group of miners that comes in every week has semi-circled around Greg's chair in absolute silence, all radiating solidarity in their glares directed at the back of Greg's head. The drunk goes to open his mouth, but Leroy clears his throat first.

"This guy giving you a problem, sister?"

"He's on his way out, actually," Emma responds, her smile widening even as her eyes narrow menacingly at Greg. He may be drunk, but he gets the hint pretty quickly. He slides off the stool, edging carefully between the sleepiest and the happiest looking miners, and stumbles towards the door. "In case it isn't obvious, you're no longer welcome in this bar. You don't have to go home, but you can't stay here." By the end of the sentence, Greg has picked up speed and fled the building and she can feel her adrenaline setting her on fire.

The rest of the bar has gone silent during the exchange, and sensing the mood, the DJ calls for the next singer to come up. Emma turns back to the shelves of liquor and shakes out her hands, tries to hop on the balls of her feet a few times to work out the tension, and when Ruby calls for a drink special, Emma busies herself with prepping it for her. She goes to flip a shaker when the song begins and promptly drops it when singing starts up, barely noticing when the metal clangs to the ground and rolls three feet away. The song is "Closing Time" by Semisonic. The singer is Killian. She suddenly forgets how to use her hands.

She tries to stay facing away from the small stage, but has a job to do and customers to serve, and that all requires turning the fuck around. But when she does, the first thing she sees is him looking right back at her, right as he sings the line "I know who I want to take me home" and suddenly her mouth is dry and her eyes wide, and lust is pooling inside of her at an alarming rate when it mixes with the leftover adrenaline. The bar needs to close now. She needs to get him and get out of here _now_. Maybe no one would notice that it's only quarter til.

It's just by chance again in her crazy life that Mary Margaret and David have stopped in to see how karaoke night is going, and that Ruby takes it upon herself to whisper something to Mary Margaret before making subtle gestures between the karaoke singer and the bartender. And that Mary Margaret nods enthusiastically.

None of this is noticed by Emma because her eyes are transfixed on the sight in front of her. Just another layer of Killian coming to light, his voice coming out beautiful and strong even through the less than stellar speakers that the DJ rolled in. He works with the rest of the patrons, convincing them to sing along, until it seems like every last person in the bar is enjoying themselves immensely. As the final lines come out, he once again meets her eyes, his smile evident even behind the microphone he's holding up.

Ruby is next to her in an instant, whispering one definitive " _Go_ " before she's ushering her from behind the bar. Mary Margaret is making similar motions to Killian and he's only two steps behind her out the door, fumbling for his keys and climbing into his truck to follow the yellow Bug the five minutes it takes to get from bar to home.

Emma knows that if this were a cheesy romcom, which her life sort of feels like at this exact moment, the scene when she and Killian pull into her driveway, when she presses him up against the side of her house under the glaring flood of the security light, when she presses a leg in between his as she pulls his face down to kiss her, when his arms come around her back to press her closer if it's even possible, all of it would be superimposed over the sound of him still singing that song.

Since that is not what her life is, they are surrounded by the silence of night, broken only by their breathing and a particularly high pitched whimper when he catches her earlobe between his teeth and whispers obscene nothings in her ear before she finally disengages and drags him into the house behind her.

Having only been in the bathroom and office, Killian is momentarily stunned as she flicks on a light and he takes in his surroundings. They both stand still, waiting to see who will initiate the next first move. As it happens, they move at the same time until they're a tangle of limbs and lips. She aims them in the direction of the couch and gently nudges him to sit.

Standing in the space between his knees for a moment, she looks down at the desire written across his face, his hair a mess from where her fingers have slid through it, a small contented smile playing on his lips as his hands find her waist and he does nothing more than look at her with the same adoration she's seen from him for weeks. If she's being really honest, it's the same look he's given her since she brought out water on that first day working. Carefully, she slides onto his lap, balancing on his knees as her legs frame his thighs. Her hands rest on his shoulders for just a moment before she tentatively reaches out to stroke her fingers along his jaw.

His Adam's apple bobs as he swallows and his lashes flutter just the slightest bit as he keeps his gaze locked with hers. "You know," he says as he tilts his head to look at her. "Nothing else could happen tonight and I would still be perfectly content. I just want you to know that, Swan."

Her smile is slow and pleased and she leans forward to kiss him again. She doesn't need to say anything else to him after that. It's all about the way her mouth moves against his. The heat is still simmering, even if the intensity has dialed back so they can actually take their time with their movements and explorations.

From there it's a trail of clothing from her living room to her bedroom, the cookie crumbs of passion ending in her bed. He urges her to lie down and her hair fans around her on the crisp sheets she's glad she remembered to change the other day. In the dark, she focuses on the way he feels, his hands trailing across her bare skin studying—each of her ribs, her navel, the spot where her leg meets her body which makes her arch off the bed—as if he'll be tested on it all later.

When they finally come together, it's in a lazy sort of way as the adrenaline is long gone from either of their systems. In its place, they are able to slide together peacefully and savor each brush of skin against skin, each soft sigh and moan. Even the race to climax is done as if they know the finish line won't move, and they take their leisurely time getting to it with Killian pushing Emma over moments before he succumbs to his own release. His weight settles on top of her for a few moments after as they come back to themselves, and Emma lifts her head enough to place an open-mouthed kiss on his shoulder, tasting the sweat that built over time.

He teases her into the infamous Tweety pajamas after they clean themselves up a little, just enough for her to wash her face and get her contacts out. His boxers are back in place, not that she's complaining, because now she knows how that happy trail ends and already can't wait to explore it again. But not now. In the morning, after sleep, and maybe even some coffee.

She's not sure if it's because they're once again clothed or because she's just not used to sleeping in a bed with someone again, but it feels far more intimate climbing under the sheets with Killian than it may have been if they'd gone to bed directly after. As it is, she relaxes into his embrace with her back to his chest, and falls asleep to the soft rumbles of his voice as his lips brush against the side of her neck.

Emma's eyes shoot open a little after 7am when the brakes of Liam's truck squeak as he pulls into the driveway next door. It's clear from the stirring behind her that Killian wasn't expecting the noisy intrusion either, and she suddenly hopes that Liam didn't leave him a message about coming in to work or something, seeing as his phone is somewhere in her house but nowhere they would've heard it.

It's funny, now, to have someone else experiencing the pain she did that first morning she woke up to the sound of chainsaws and the wood chipper, except this time it's just a lawn mower. Especially with how little they ended up sleeping once they got back to her place, she knows with absolute certainty that his brain must feel like jello.

While Killian groans and complains about the noise, Emma explains to him that one morning, weeks ago, she could hear him talking to Liam as they finished the landscaping, and that she just couldn't stop herself from reaching her hand between her legs—and he cuts her off there, rolling her onto her back with a growl as his body covers hers. Other than a surprised squeak, she makes no protest to the way his hips are grinding against hers, how he finds just the right angle to push that has her gasping, how his hands and lips seem to be everywhere at once as he circles his arousal against her, taking her higher and higher without it even directly touching her.

When she gets the chance, she flips them so he's splayed out on her bed. "See," she comments as she sucks a mark onto his collarbone. "This is so much better when someone is sharing in the misery." She works his boxers off his hips, sliding them down his legs and dropping them off the side of the bed before crawling her way back up to his face.

"Darling, if this is misery then I will gladly be miserable with you all the time," he says against her lips as he pulls her up. Her hand is on a slow descent between their bodies with one destination in mind when they're both reminded of how they were woken up.

They both freeze cold when Liam's voice comes booming through the walls, laughing at the particular placement of a certain truck in the wrong driveway, and her wide and stunned eyes meet Killian's. She scrambles off to the side as Killian springs from the bed, quiet profanities slipping from him in an almost endless stream as he paces the small area between the bed and the wall. Emma takes a moment to appreciate the view. On one hand, he's finding out the wonders of being disturbed by his own company. On the other, he's very naked, very aroused, and if he knows what's good for him, very much not leaving this bedroom.

He's still mumbling something vague about maiming his brother, so Emma takes a moment to shimmy out of her pajama pants and yank the shirt over her head. She throws both items at his head and that, in combination with one sharp "Pssst!" has him remembering where he was before they were so rudely interrupted. From somewhere in the house, they hear the ping of a text, but Killian just smiles and shakes his head. Texts can wait. Noises can wait.

In the light of day, it's so different and yet exactly the same. As he crawls back onto the bed and pulls her back into his arms, they find the same coupling rhythm they found the night before. They're a little quieter this time, under the circumstances, but the hushed tones and breathy exclamations are all either of them need. By the time they're finished with each other, the lawn care of the tiny yard next door has also wrapped up, and Emma and Killian are left to the silence once more, easily slipping back to sleep.

She dreams of roots, the ones she searched for as a child but never found, and the ones that escaped her as she grew older. Funny that she found them, finally, with someone in the business of pulling them up.


End file.
